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"The Koch Brothers Take On Enviro Groups Over Mine"

"As the Environmental Protection Agency seeks public comment on how to gauge the environmental impact of a proposed gold and copper mine in the Bristol Bay watershed, hundreds of thousands of Americans have weighed in on one side or another."

"Almost all the mass e-mail comments urging the EPA to refrain from blocking the project — 99.25 percent, to be exact — come from a project established by the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a libertarian group that accepts money from mining companies as well as the conservative Koch brothers. Resourceful Earth, the CEI project, accounts for 117,401 out of 118,294 mass e-mail comments suggesting EPA should stay out of the matter.

Meanwhile, almost all the comments urging the EPA to block the mine have been generated by major environmental groups. Their efforts have resulted in three times as many mass e-mail comments -- 306,198 so far -- which argue that the EPA should invoke a rarely-used authority under the Clean Water Act to block the proposed Pebble Mine, on the grounds that it could imperil the region’s vibrant sockeye salmon fishery. The Natural Resources Defense Council produced 83,095 comments, more than any other group in favor of EPA action, while the Pew Charitable Trusts came in second with 41,158 comments."